Poll!! How many of you still wear masks?

[c-a-r-f-r-e-w]

Just the one answer for this poll, not multiple choice, obvs. (Feel free to comment and give reasons if you like…)

[mercian]

I could have done with a 'never' option. But then I always liked living on the edge 😁

[John Chanin]

Only when I am feeling ill, and need therefore to protect others.

[alurqa]

Jun 8, 2023 17:37:00 GMT John Chanin said:

Only when I am feeling ill, and need therefore to protect others.

Precisely. I thought mask wearing was exactly this -- not to protect yourself from others.

[Mr Poppy]

No option for ANFIW 'Absolutely No F*ing Interest Whatsoever' (a glorified DK option). So I'll abstain. However, thank you for at least posting this on a separate thread. IIRC there was a poll about whether 'Specific Issues' should stay on 'Issue Specific' threads.

ukpollingreport2.proboards.com/thread/7/board

By all means re-run that poll but in terms of an 'Important' (ie polling relevant) issue then Covid, for the vast majority of people, is NFI

[alec]

alurqa - "Precisely. I thought mask wearing was exactly this -- not to protect yourself from others."

Yes, but sadly with ~30% of covid cases asymptomatic, you may never know if you've set off a chain of transmission that kills some unknown vulnerable person.

Meanwhile, this is the kind of nonsense we're having to deal with; from the Buckinghamshire Disability Service - "We were contacted today by a lawyer who's client had been told by nurses that wearing a PPE mask in hospital was a symptom of psychosis because 'Covid is no longer an issue worrying rational people'."

So, the official guidance is that vulnerable people and those who choose to should protect themselves by wearing a mask, particularly in high risk settings, and then when you get to a high risk setting hospital, some thick as mince NHS nurse tells you that you're suffering from psychosis.

The NHS is killing people. Not good enough.

[Mark]

I still wear a mask if I've got to go to the doctors, or if I'm somewhere indoors where you are likely to get physically close to someone, for example, a shop or supermarket.

This is not for protection to myself, but, to protect others.

You have no way of telling if the stranger in front of you, who may look fine, may, in fact, be vulnerable and cop it badly if they get covid (or any respitory disease).

It may be someone with a weak heart, for example.

Plus, even if we eventually learn that a mask makes no difference, what have I lost by wearing one? It's hardly an imposition.

[lens]

Jun 8, 2023 20:18:20 GMT Mark said:

Plus, even if we eventually learn that a mask makes no difference, what have I lost by wearing one? It's hardly an imposition.

Mark - that may be fine for you, but to anyone with even a low degree of hearing impairment, general masking has been a nightmare and has been highly exclusionary. There's also a big difference for anyone needing to wear glasses. Step only access may not be any imposition to most people - a very diffferent story to the wheelchair bound.

That aside, I've put up with forced mask wearing at the height of the pandemic, and still would for certain clinical situations or (say) visiting somewhere with many vulnerable people. But now, with such widespread vaccination, it's a question of where to draw a line. Does anyone really expect widespread mask wearing to persist indefinitely whenever in public?

I've also had someone say to me they were wearing a mask one day "because I don't feel very well, and wouldn't want to infect anyone". Which I find unbelievable. They should have stayed at home, and relying on a mask to protect others irresponsible. But it's a function of putting too much faith in the wrong direction, and may go some way to explaining why general mask mandates don't seem to have had much effect, whereas more targeted and clinical situations have.

[Deleted]

I still wore a mask in supermarkets and sometimes trains until a couple of months  ago but have now virtually ceased to do so. Not a conscious decision, in fact the first couple of times without a mask was due to forgetting to put one in my pocket before heading out. But I've now got out of the habit.

Ironically, during a visit to Tesco today, there seemed to be noticeably more masks in evidence than I have seen for some time. Not loads, but more than I  have clocked lately. I was also surprised to note that a fellow shopper was a casually dressed Marcus Fysh, Tory MP for Yeovil. I wonder if Jacob Rees-Mogg would approve of 'public servants' being away from the workplace during the working week?

[Danny]

Jun 8, 2023 21:44:14 GMT lens said:

But now, with such widespread vaccination, it's a question of where to draw a line.

The cumulative covid death toll was 0.07% in September 2020, after the first wave but before the second kent wave. It rose to 0.2% by May 21, so after that wave. 0.07% died in first wave, 0.13 in the second wave so thats twice as many. From July 2021 the total started rising again on a steady trajectory which was more or less constant up to the end of dec 22, when the FT stopped maintaining their data page. By then the cumulative total had reached 0.31%, so approximately another 0.1% fo the population in that 18 months, or 0.07% per year. ig.ft.com/coronavirus-chart/?areas=eur&areas=usa&areas=jpn&areas=grc&areas=nzl&areas=e92000001&areasRegional=usny&areasRegional=usnm&areasRegional=uspr&areasRegional=usaz&areasRegional=usfl&areasRegional=usnd&cumulative=1&logScale=0&per100K=1&startDate=2020-03-03&values=deaths

Roughly, the death rate in 22 after vaccination was half that in the first year of the epidemic.  Given that doctors claimed advances in treatment had halved the death rate anyway, that implies vaccination had no effect on the death rate.

Of course, this takes no account of people dying with covid instead of from covid, but still being reported as covid deaths. However any correction ought to apply to earlier deaths figures too.